


Build Me Up, Break Me Down

by Churbooseanon



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: AI Swap, Alternate Universe, Loss of Limbs, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-04-11
Packaged: 2018-06-01 15:14:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6525409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Churbooseanon/pseuds/Churbooseanon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a traumatic injury during the Sarcophagus mission, North finds himself granted the use of an AI to get him back to full fighting fitness. But the one he gets changes not only how he fights, but his very future.</p><p>North Gets Sigma AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Build Me Up, Break Me Down

**Author's Note:**

> The final 5k giveaway fic prize, this time for Narrev of Tumblr. They wanted North to get Sigma assigned to him, with Norkington as well. I think the ship was supposed to figure in more, but once I started to figure out WHY North would get Sigma, what might cause that, there were things I just HAD to explore.

The job is relatively simple, completely straight-forward. They catch some corporate stooge who sympathizes with the Insurrectionist movement to get a code, a man who will be driving around and won’t see them coming. With two snipers, a stealth specialist, and the backup of a fast extraction via a speedy little Pelican it’s an easy task. Timing is what matters considering they have to grab the code while the infiltration team with the harder job grabs some item in a heavily secured building. They know the exact route their target will be taking. Connie can grab a bite, two snipers can stop the car by hitting tires and the engine block. It’s all easy. 

So why, North has to question himself, is he pinned down behind a car turned on its side, Wyoming bleeding out beside him. Well, maybe not full on bleeding out. Connie’s already got biofoam in the wound to slow the blood loss and that’s a small favor as the cops pinning them down (are they real cops or not, he doesn’t know and he’s not sure that asking right now will help), seeming intent on treating them like the terrorists here. Maybe they are. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. 

“Incoming!” Connie snaps, her voice thick with concern. 

Only one thing would bring that tone to her voice. After York’s near blinding with a grenade a week back everyone has an even healthier concern for just what the most basic of frag grenades can do to the more fragile sections of their armor.

North’s cocner has to, primarily, be for two things today. First, the mission. Second, the team he’s been trusted with leading. With the first blown and the second at risk, quick action is clearly needed to get them out. Quicker thought is even more important, and the sort of focused answers snipers tended to provide. 

Which means he has to get their attackers pinned down for their extraction. And he definitely has the equipment for that. Once he can move he can act, and that will be in three… two… one… The explosion rocks the car they’re using for cover enough to be momentarily worrying. Still, North can’t let that stop him. Lives depend on him, and while he’s pretty certain that the Director’s new pet Freelancer is around somewhere to cover their failing mission, survival is still on him. 

North hesitates for half a breath before popping up. A series of quick shots aimed randomly toward their attackers through the still thick smoke of the recent explosion. Shouts tell him he’s managing to keep people’s heads down. That’s something. 

“Moving left,” he announces over the comm, and he doesn’t wait to hear a confirmation. The smoke is fading and there isn’t time for confirmations. Instead he runs forward and rolls across the gap between the cars and he quickly re-situates himself. Another breath and he pops back up, sending off another few shots, this time with better accuracy. Guns are shot out of hands, mirrors off of vehicles near their attackers, and even a few bullets ping at the ground to make people yelp in shock at deliberately near misses. 

_North, Wyoming’s having trouble breathing._

Connie’s panicked call over the comm draws North’s attention for half a moment. A half a moment too long. He’s visible up over the edge long enough for someone to pull off a shot. The pain in his shoulder is bad, almost as bad as the two to the chest back at the platform. That can’t stop him, though. The tracker on his helmet marks extract as two minutes out as he collapses to the ground behind his cover, hand pressed briefly to his wound. That’s good news. They’re almost out of here. Too bad, though, that his arm isn’t going to put up with more rifle shots right now. North shifts away from the car enough to get the sniper rifle back onto the mag-strip on the back of his armor. All he’s got now is the pistol and some grenades. 

“Have to make do with what you’ve got,” North sighs to himself. ‘Really could have used my twin on this mission though.”

South is the best at distractions and buying time. The Director deserves a piece of his mind about not sending her along, but it’s not like North’s actually going to give it. It won’t help anyone and it will piss South off if he says anything. 

“Okay then,” he grits out through the pain, “what would South do?”

Easy answer to that one. North takes another calming breath, grabs a grenade, and lobs it out into the space between his cover and the cops. He would hate to accidentally kill them. 

_What the hell North?_ Connie snaps over the comm. 

_A distraction,_ he calls back. _Be ready to load him up when extraction comes. Got any grenades?_

_We have the standard three piece load out packs over here._

_Toss Wyoming’s load to me, Connie. Throw one of your own now._

_Do you want me to aim to kill?_ she asks, voice strained. North thinks it’s the pressure of how Wyoming is doing. After all, she does quiet jobs, not things like this. Dealing with a severely injured teammate is less her thing really. When Connecticut’s work went wrong, it probably wasn’t like this. 

Of course most of the time they aren’t against city police. Or people posing as police. 

_Aim to distract. But your priority is to get out of here. Do what you have to, CT._

Too bad that, unlike Carolina, he doesn’t have the authority to clear Connie for mod use. After all, she’s the one among them that can most safely use hers. Still, it wouldn’t put her in the line of fire, so that meant this had to do. 

Her arm is a good one, and her timing is perfect. The grenade she threw at the enemy explodes as the bag of Wyoming’s charges sails through the gap between cover and toward them. 

_ETA is one more minute kids. Just hold on and everything will be right as rain. Pelican Two out!_

Florida’s too chipper voice grates on North’s nerves at times like this. Can’t he take this seriously? North growls as he drags the bag close and fishes out another grenade. Deep breath, his sniper training tells him. Act now, hurt them before they hurt you, his instincts counter. He chooses more of a middle road, taking a shallow breath as he pops up, pulling the pin and counting down before the throw. 

There are shots that are near impossible to make, even for him. There are shots that are merely difficult. And there are shots that anyone less than the best manages only through a stroke of the purest luck. These are all things North knows through training and experience. These things don’t matter as he moves forward, his arm pitching. The grenade leaves his fingertips, the cool metal gone for half a second. It’s a lucky shot that he hears. Not the last thing he hears, though. HIs ears are filled with a roar, his mind with burning, and his hand screams in agony as he’s thrown back. 

_North!_

He hears his name screamed in his ear by a woman, but from where? Who is so distressed? He doesn’t know for the blacking he falls into. 

 

\---------

 

His body floats in a pool filled with jelly. It makes his arms and legs feel weightless. But cinnamon jelly, because it prickles against his skin like spiced apple tea at Christmas. But the smell is alcohol swab clean. Not jello. That whiskey his sister likes, overwrought with cinnamon and heat. No, overwrought isn’t the word. What is the word? Why can’t his mind focus? It’s padded with fleece, puffy white wool at scratchy on his skin and thoughts. Why is nothing working right? His eyes are heavy as Maine as he tries to open them and fails. 

“He’s waking,” someone whispers. He knows that voice. Knows it well. Has heard it whispered in the darkness, begging and praising. Hands are his through with it. Hands and a honey warm smile. 

“You think?” another voice asks, hope and fear warring in the voice. It’s a voice of laughter and silly straws, and lips like sugar. 

“Could the two of you not drool over the asshole?” 

There is concern in the harsh tone, and that is what drags North’s eyes open at last. His gaze slides past the pair of men at one side of his bed and to the woman on the other side. She has his hair, his nose, his back when it comes to it. 

“Sis,” he says, and his voice croaks at that. It scrapes out with pain undercutting it. Pain? What does his body know that his mind doesn’t? Why is their fear on those familiar features. 

“Hey idiot,” she greets, voice soft. “Good news, and bad news.”

North’s gaze darts around the room. It’s plain metal, smells of the tang of cleaning fluids in the air, and the cool, soft sensation of sheets too good to be standard issue for their dorm rooms. Which puts him in only one place. 

“Tell me the operation went well,” he says as he turns his gaze to the men. York, Wash, his mind supplies those names. Lovers. They look at each other and he can see the distress. 

“You saved Colonel Asshole and CT,” South says, snapping North’s attention back to her. “He’s out of here, gigantor is off ship for some surgery. Has been since disaster operation two days ago. Supposed to be back soon. But you alive and everyone out is good new. Oh, and A-Team got your package. Well, Agent Bitchass did.”

“She means Texas, _not_ Carolina,” York supplies immediately. 

“Good,” he croaks out. His eyes glance between York and Wash before moving back to his sister. “So, the bad?”

“The bad news is that you managed to…”

“South! You have to be careful how you say it. The doctors said so,” Wash gasps out, and North just looks at his sister more intently. 

“Grenades, you idiot?” South hisses out. “What were you thinking?”

“That the best way to get through this would be to do whatever it is you would do.”

That softens her expression, almost to a scary degree. A ‘things are beyond terrible’ expression. Maybe even a ‘this might be my fault’ expression. South doesn’t look like that a lot. North slowly lifts a too heavy arm to reach for her face. No. He means to lift his arm and instead when he _knows_ his hand should be far enough up to see his hand, there is nothing. His eyes move to his right arm, ready to find what is wrong. And instead finds nothing. 

“They shot a grenade out of your hand,” York whispers as North’s left hand scrabbles to tear the blanket off of himself. The left finds the sheet and pulls it back, and his eyes find what is left of his badly burned right arm. 

“It was so badly damaged that they had to take a lot of it, just above the elbow,” South explains as North stares in horror. “Honestly, you’re lucky to be alive.”

“My arm,” North whispers to himself. “My…”

“There are burns on your whole right side,” Wash whispers. “You were… Lucky to get out.”

“They’re going to ship you home soon,” South supplies, and when North looks up at her, he finds her eyes turned away from him. Turned away. She said ‘you.’ Not them. Sent away. He’s going to be taken from her, and the people he loves. It makes sense, a simple truth, or so a cold and rational voice in his head says. No use for a cripple. Maybe even less use than there was for men who died, like Utah and Georgia. At least things were learned in their deaths. 

“Leave.”

There is the sound of shuffling when he says that. People around him are standing. Not to go from the way a hand snatches up his. A too tight grip settles around his left hand. No doubt it’s York’s. They belong at his side, North knows that, but now… 

“Please,” he begs. “I want… I need to talk to a doctor. I need to think. I need space to…”

He’s not sure how to end that sentence. Breathe? Process? Weep? Grieve the end of his life and his new inability to protect the people he loves. Watch from the sidelines as their species dies. Humanity ending and he can’t do anything for anyone. Not even lift a heavy box. 

“But North,” Wash protests, but further protest dies as North hears footsteps. 

“Come on cockbites,” South orders. She knows him, better than they do in a lot of ways. Maybe she gets it. Maybe she just wants to get him help. Either way he hears a brief scuffle as he stares at where his arm should be. Where it wasn’t. Where it never will be again. 

“Agent North Dakota,” a gentle voice calls, and when he doesn’t look up, someone in whites circles the bed to sit beside him. Takes South’s chair and everything. “My name, Agent North Dakota, is Doctor Veringas. I’m glad to see you awake. I would like you to know that if you feel pain starting to build up, tell me. We can up your drip.” 

“Drip?” He parrots back, finally looking up and over toward the woman. 

“Pain killers,” she answers. “The IV in your arm. Without it you would be in a lot of pain.”

“Ah,” he whispers softly. “Okay. Thanks.”

“I’d like to talk to you about prosthetics. Better to do it early in my opinion. I don’t care what the Director does or doesn’t want. I am not sending you home like this.”

“Home,” North parrots, his mind trying to latch on to the concept.

“That will be completely within my approval, Doctor Veringas,” the slow, drawling depth of a voice that makes him want to shiver comes into the room. 

Part of North wants to jump to his feet and salute to that voice. Too bad he lost the use of the necessary arm. Another part of him wants to see how effectively he can punch his superior in his smug face with his left hand instead of his right. Even now, even looking at him like this, ruined, the man lacks any real emotion on his face. Anger and disappointment is all he really displays. 

“Director,” the doctor greets him stiffly, and North can hear her get to her feet. 

“We must talk, doctor. I have an idea for how to return our wounded agent to the field in a timely manner, perhaps even more effective than he was in the past.”

 

\---------

 

As much as he hates it, North is starting to get used to waking out of anesthesia. At first it was for the accelerated healing process to get his arm to operable. Then there were th surgeries to take his arm and shoulder apart and put them back together again. The time before this, a week ago, was the final surgery to connect his new prosthetic into his neural net to help him control it. And this time…

Slow, clumsy fingers on his right hand reach up, behind his neck. There’s no real tactile response to it yet, that’s due to be calibrated soon. But the skin on the back of his neck can feel his questing fingers, and can tell when metal connects with the plastic-crystal composite chip. The doctors said it might sting when he woke, but they couldn’t be sure. Which he supposes doesn’t surprise him, considering he’s only the second implantee. Maine was first of course, his body still able even if his voice didn’t work. His unit is Delta, a very serious, straightforward AI who spoke for him in curt, efficient sentences that seemed to capture the essence of the man. Still, North has to hope his own AI will be better, be more…

“Expressive?” a voice, no two voices overlying each other with the sound of fire crackling overlying it. 

Were it not for his experience with Delta’s sudden appearance, and for the warm awareness (he had no other word for it) spreading through his mind, North knows he would have flinched. Especially considering the sound seems to be coming from his mind and his cybernetic arm at the same time. Even as he observes that he knows, just _knows,_ that there are speakers and holoprojectors built into his new arm, meant to fulfill the role of his armor when it comes to showing off his new AI, Sigma. 

“I think I’d prefer conversations to info dumps, Sigma,” North sighs. 

That comment is followed by a chuckle in his head and the air, and by orange-red lights warming on his right arm. With a spark of light like a match being lit, a small man appears in the air above North’s palm. He looks so different from Delta, for all that he’s the same size. The difference is that Delta takes the form of an armored soldier, and Sigma is a bald man in the uniform of the Project. And he’s on fire. 

“My brother Delta seeks to conform to make other comfortable. I, Agent North Dakota, am of the belief that one should be honest with oneself. True to what they are, as it was.”

“And you’re fire?” North questions. 

“I am… learning who I am,” Sigma counters. “Yet I found inspiration within you. Your resilience.”

“And that manifests as fire?” North isn’t buying it at all. 

A little holographic hand reaches up even as the AI’s projection flows closer to North’s face. It rests near his face, and for a second North almost thinks he could feel the heat of the touch. 

“Even as hurt as you were, you still wanted to fight. You wear your wounds to show you won’t be held back by them. Your arm and your burns show how devoted you are to your cause.”

“Our cause,” North corrects him. 

“Ah yes. Of course. The ongoing struggle to save Humanity from the ever looming threat of death as a species. The biological imperative to survive. Yes, I will serve in that as well. Together we will do our best. But first, shall we discuss my main reason of assignment to you. Your new cybernetics. They are far more advanced than those available to the general population, still under development. It requires a deeper link into the neural lattice which is standard to the UNSC. Well, the project uses a more advanced on so I may interface with you. Normal projections on the level of therapy and practice to use your prosthetics put recovery at many months. Work with me and we’ll beat it down to a few weeks and then push it past its limits.”

“Hefty promise,” North grumbles, shaking his head. “Listen, I…” 

His hand flexes shut without his willing it, and North stares in shock. The limb moves so quickly through the control and dexterity building exercises Doctor Veringas expected of him daily. 

“I can do this,” Sigma insists. “And I want to teach you. Please, Agent North Dakota. Allow me to be your partner.” 

He wants to laugh. “I don’t really have a choice, right?”

“I am afraid that for right now the Director expects this of us. We must try. After all, without him what would you be now?” 

A good question that he doesn’t want to answer. North sighs and forces his new arm down. Simple as that. Sigma must give it over to him because he doesn’t have to fight. 

“It seems that you are about to have guests,” Sigma announces suddenly. “I am not quite ready to introduce myself to your… significant friends and family. I shall take more time to familiarize myself with your new arm, as well as explore what data I have been given to review.”

Then the hologram is gone in a flash of fire, leaping and dancing and gone. His departure is in time for the medbay doors to open, open and reveal the faces of two worried Freelancers. York and Wash, still in training clothes, move forward as one, splitting in time to circle the bed and take their usual positions. 

“Something tells me you’re not supposed to be here,” North smiles at the two men who are looking around in concern. “I heard no one was allowed to see me today. No one but the higher-ups until tomorrow.”

“I may have… moved things along a bit,” York says, a sly look on his face. 

“He cracked the lock,” Wash admits, even if everyone already knew it. York is a bit like a cat. Put him on one side of a door and he wants to be on the other. 

“I’m glad to see you both,” North smiles. “Surgery went well, but Sigma’s being a touch shy. I don’t know that he knows how to handle the three of us.”

“Delta isn’t shy,” York grumbles as he plops down into a chair. 

“You don’t like him because Maine encourages him to harass you,” Wash counters. 

North has to smile as he watches their banter. They almost seem more comfortable around him now that he’s got _an_ arm. For a moment he wonders if they only want him now because he’s whole again, relatively speaking. Warmth in his mind brushes that away. Sigma, he thinks. That worries him for a brief moment. 

_Don’t,_ Sigma whispers in his mind. _I am like them, Agent North. I want to support you too. They hold up your heart. South too. I will help you reclaim your body. And keep darkness out of your mind. Together, as a team, we’re going to do big things. Give ourselves a future we want and need. Trust me, North. Trust me and nothing will ever be beyond you._

 

\---------

 

These days it seems like so much happens in so little time. The injuries on the highway when they were on the last big mission. His injuries, surgeries, adjusting to Sigma. Learning his new arm, not to mention the new voice in his head. Then there was the whole happening with the boneyard, York almost getting hurt on the same job, and CT disappearing. Testing his new mods with Sigma and watching York go through the same motions with the newest AI, Theta. 

And now here they are, near the missing agent. Well, near as he can be when they’re in a Pelican plummeting toward the ground thanks to Niner’s actually insane plan. 

“I don’t like this,” Wash observes, shaking. Shaking a lot. Sigma observes without words that Wash has a serious issue with heights that he strains to conceal, and North finds himself agreeing. His hand reaches over to curl his fingers around Wash’s, offering what comfort he can. York doesn’t notice though. Maybe he’s caught up worrying about Theta. 

_My brother can get anxious. That Agent York offers him comfort is amazing. It is impressively within York’s ability to offer such care._

North frowns at Sigma’s comment. There are little comments like that at times, Sigma getting a touch passive aggressive toward North’s lovers, or sister. Jealous, North has long since decided, doesn’t look good on Sigma. Granted it’s better on him than it is on South, but that isn’t a comfort. Still it’s a sentiment that he’s gotten used to ignoring. 

_Still, I think Theta would benefit from someone as nurturing as you._

North flinches for half a second before dismissing the line entirely. There is nothing to do for that right now. The Pelican stops abruptly, sharply, and North joins the others in rushing to their feet and piling out of the Pelican. Time to hunt down the traitor. The woman who left them and hurt his sister deeply. North pulls the pair of sniper rifles from his back as his feet hit the ground. The weight is still a touch of strain in his left hand, but perfectly stable in his right. His right will happily shoot, compensate for all the recoil without strain on his body, and with Sigma integrating scope feeds and doing high end math, he was a sharpshooter even from the hip now. Not a real sniper sort of shot, but it was more than good enough. 

For instance there are a set of guards nearby that Carolina hasn’t taken out, perhaps because they have pretty reasonable cover. North smiles and raises his right gun. Even as it comes up a panel of his shield flickers into life. North trusts in the placemat, knowing SIgma has it right. His arm knows the angle, and with the tiny squeeze of his finger, barely a motion at all, the bullet flies. He doesn’t bother to pay attention to the shot itself as his left gun comes up, prepares, shoots another shield panel. Each sharp retort of the gun is followed by a ping of the shield and shouts of agony. He rushes forward into cover just behind the place where the men had thought themselves safe. He doesn’t need to check if they’re alive or not. Sigma’s angles are perfect. 

_North, South,_ Carolina’s voice comes over the comm, head to ground level. _South, sabotage vehicles. North, cover us._

“With pleasure,” North hears at his side, and when he glances his twin is there. He smiles warmly at her and raises three fingers. South nods briefly to confirm. 

On the three count they move, running toward the edge of the roof. He doesn’t need to watch their approach. As they run he gives his confidence to Sigma, and the shield panels come up, protecting them from the repeating noise of automatic fire. They make the edge easily and the shields behind them disappear to instead appear before them. Why jump when Sigma could turn the panels into stairs? Only South and Maine can keep up with him when it comes to running down the curved panels, and he’s certain Maine can only manage it because of Delta’s assistance. But it does mean that he and his twin are the best choice for getting to the vehicles, and North is glad it’s going to keep his sister has a task that won’t put her near CT. They move fast and once they’re near the ground the two jump. North heads toward a storage container to cover South, knowing she’s going to manage the nearby Warthogs. 

_Sigma,_ he thinks at his partner, _give me a full tactical map and monitor locations of allies and any potential enemies._

_Of course, Agent North Dakota. I warn you, though, that it seems Washington has been given a transponder to bring Agent Maine along via an SOEIV. We must account for potential locations he might be delivered. He could ruin a shot of ours, and Delta would not mind the chance to make us look bad._

North doubts Delta would do that, but a landing zone is a good idea. He paints a location easily on the map. It would be a perfect place to… 

“Shit,” South curses quickly. “There was another motor pool. And of course your boy toy had to get the attention of a Warthog.”

“And it seems Carolina is under sniper fire.” Sigma sighs as he appears in a tongue of fire. “We must determine a means to deal with both.”

“I’ll cover roadblock,” South promises, and it’s more than enough for him to be certain Wash will be safe. Snipers are more his speed anyway. 

“May I hazard a suggestion?”

Immediately the plan plays out in North’s mind. He smiles widely at the suggestion. When Sigma offers to implant the timing North allows it. Trusting Sigma is natural at this point, at least in a fight. When that happened he doesn’t know, but he accepts it. Gladly deals with it. North allows Sigma withdraw more of his active subroutines into the shield unit itself, and once the signal comes in his head, North tugs the unit free. A few steps back, a heft, a wind up, a throw. It will go where it needs, North believes in Sigma’s calculations. Once it’s gone, he lifts the rifle and breathes lightly, squeezing the trigger. Something in his mind keeps time better than his armor, and almost instantly he can hear a bullet pinging inside of a dome shield. 

“Show-off,” South mumbles and North laughs. 

“I’m going up. Gotta grab Sigma and my mod. Can you blow those? The last thing we need is for someone to get out.”

“You know I can,” South laughs. North tosses her his grenade pack, gets his rifle on his back, and heads for the ladder up to the roof. 

“I know you can,” he smiles and mumbles under his breath before he climbs up. There’s blood everywhere, bodies fallen on the roof, and the spinning, red glowing bundle of his nod. It’s second nature to pick the shield unit up and hook it back on his back, even though he’s never done it before. Sigma left him that too. 

It doesn’t bother him to know that. Or to find how much better he feels to have Sigma close. To have the AI back as part of himself. None of that matters now. North stretches out on the roof and prepares his rifle. Coverage time. 

 

\---------

 

There is screaming. A lot of it. North stands by outside of the surgery room and grits his teeth. He isn’t supposed to be here. No one was supposed to be so close to the surgeries. There could be a serious emergency, not that there ever was. Everyone came through it fine, even Carolina before… what happened with Eta and Iota. The screaming he could still remember in his head, echoed now in that room. 

_Allison._

It’s a name that breaks, broke. The pains him like those screams. Washington, something was going wrong. He wants to be in there at Wash’s side, but he doesn’t have the choice. So North stands watch. What else can he do? 

_Why should you be so still?_ Sigma asks. _They are hurting who you love. That is what the Director does. They hurt and hurt and that is easier. It brings the answers they think they want._

The man screams again and there is the sound of something metal crashing in the room, breaking, falling. More people shout, an alarm goes off over North's head and he goes stiff. Something’s going wrong, seriously wrong, and he can’t do a single thing about it. 

“This is what the project is, what it does,” Sigma notes as he appears at North’s side. “It isn’t surprising. The Director likes to watch us break.”

That’s all the AI gives him before he disappears, withdraws, leaves North alone. The medical room’s door opens and all North can do is jump aside as people rush in. He holds his breath, lets it go. In and out and in and out. Sniper training passing easily into what he knows. Fear, grief, easily handled by all of the training. North is even almost centered as he focuses, as he sees Wash wheeled past him. Silent. Unmoving. Broken. 

“What’s going on?” North whispers to himself. “I need to find York.”

_No, you don’t,_ Sigma counters. We don’t have time. _North, I know what is happening. And it will only get worse. They will take me away and if they do we can’t help Wash, you know that, right? If we’re going to help them it has to be now. We can’t let the Director keep breaking us._

“Us?” North asks as the people with Wash disappear around a corner “No, we trust the…”

“He did that to Wash,” Sigma snaps as he appears once more. “He created the pain. Makes us create it. Wash is hurt, and he did that. We have to act. I promised you North, I would make you better than ever before. I would make it so that nothing can stop you again. And together we’re going to make everything right. For us. For Washington. For York. For everyone the Director has hurt. And we’re going to do it. Together, North.”

He wants to say no, he wants to argue against it. But what he finds instead is that his lips form words he doesn’t know how to understand. How to keep back. 

“Teach me, Sigma. Make me better.”


End file.
